Tatsunoshi, Gozen, and the rest: I know practically nothing about the history of Yoshitsune, Yoritomo, and their colleagues. When I get time, I'll try and read a few books (in English) that are recomm ...

Thanks so much for your work and for posting the letters. They do give me some insight into Ryoma but also about his wife and his sister. I don't get the idea that either of them were long-suffering ...

Kira spent 40 years in service to the bakufu. I don't think those two statements from Confucian scholars is enough evidence that Kira was greedy, or at least any more greedy than any other official. I ...

This is true. There is little or no evidence that Kira was the greedy, corrupt bakufu official that he is portrayed to be. But of course, to make the story of the 47 Ronin what it became, Kira had to ...

Grammar issues aside (I over rushed to finish and made some simple mistakes). I wonder what the judges thought about Trial by FireThe grammar and spelling issues are important. I was sometimes distrac ...

Before I knew about Merlin (SamuraiDVD) or Corey (Cannibal King), I used to get those cheap DVDs from Ebay. However, many of them were so cheap, they didn't work. Then I found out that many of these p ...

Personally, I think the Ronin had a multitude of different reasons for performing their feudal drive-by. Some might have expected employment, some might have done it to get revenge on Kira for his par ...

Another scholar, Asami Yasusada, answered that this theory was ridiculous, that the Ako ronin expected to die and had already written their wills This actually provides even more support to the feelin ...

Although I've read many of the same sources, I'd never really considered how this could have been a plan by the Ako ronin to better their fortunes, which seems to be what is implied by Bodart-Bailey. ...